


The Nature of Hope

by Stariceling



Category: Naruto
Genre: Community: 10_whores, Gen, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-17
Updated: 2010-06-17
Packaged: 2017-12-06 01:50:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/730248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stariceling/pseuds/Stariceling
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shortly after the chuunin exam. Sasuke happens upon Lee studying an unexpected subject. He doesn't see how mythology is going to help Lee with anything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Nature of Hope

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Pandora's Box  
> Set at some point between the chuunin exam and Lee's recovery. (Takes place between "Stubborn and Rough" and "Scars" but can be read as a standalone)

Sasuke knew what he was going to find even before he was fully aware of where he was going. Lee was in his usual place, sitting alone in the middle of the small clearing he always seemed to gravitate to on clear days. He had his crutch beside him, a small pile of books and scrolls spread out in front of him. As usual he was wearing same robe, loose around the casts on his arm and leg, and that same determined frown on his face.

Of course he knew Lee would be here. Sasuke suspected this had been Lee's private training grounds at one point. There was a tree trunk at one end of the clearing with rounded hollows that marked where it had been used as a punching block, as well as other, less obvious, scuffs and scars that marked a place used habitually by any training ninja. By now the trampled grass had grown back and the forest was already healing away the marks of Lee's efforts.

Belatedly, Sasuke realized the time to stand and study the landscape had passed. Lee was watching him over the top of the scroll he was holding. He could always turn and leave. Not like he had any specific reason for wandering here.

"Good afternoon, Sasuke-kun," Lee greeted him, correctly guessing the moment when Sasuke realized that his presence had been noticed.

"Yo."

Sasuke wasn't exactly committing to anything when he walked over to get a better look at what Lee was reading. He crouched and turned over one of the books to read the title. _Shadowboxing for the Practical Shinoubi_ was on top, apparently just laid aside. The book under that was, _Common Carnivore Diets: Preparing meals live, raw, preserved, and otherwise_ , which was not only dog-eared, but had bite marks in the cover. Some of the scrolls were marked as having notes for surviving in a particular terrain or culture. Others had marks dealing with various flora and fauna, venoms and poisons. . . .

"Did I take a book you were looking for?" Lee asked, apparently trying to be considerate.

"No."

Sasuke almost asked what Lee wanted with such unrelated subjects, but in the back of his mind he already knew. Studying like this, accumulating random information that might theoretically be useful someday, was what one did with oneself when there was nothing to do but sit and heal and slowly go insane from the waiting. At least, that was how Sasuke saw it.

Once he was already crouched down to look at the complete hodgepodge of reading material Lee had collected it was natural to simply sit in the grass. Sasuke wasn't thinking too deeply about what he was doing.

How had Lee gotten all of those books out here, anyway?

"How has your day been?" Lee asked.

Sasuke just looked at him. He had honestly expected Lee to nonchalantly go back to his reading and ignore him company. The polite query seemed completely out of place, somehow. He hadn't known Lee long, and hardly expected to be on casual speaking terms with him.

"I had a mission this morning," Sasuke answered. "It was just a D-rank delivery. Nothing interesting." Without giving Lee more than a heartbeat to respond, Sasuke changed the subject, "What is this, anyway?" he asked, indicating the half-unrolled scroll in Lee's hand.

"Stories, mostly. They're interesting." Lee unrolled the scroll to allow Sasuke to see more clearly.

The stories were collected from a place called Graecia. Sasuke guessed it would be too small or too far away for Lee learning their folk tales to ever have any practical use. He hardly paid attention when Lee started relating one story to him.

It was about a woman who was given an insatiable curiosity, a sealed jar, and the name Pandora. Even though Sasuke was only listening with half an ear, he picked up a few of the details that Lee emphasized. A jar of smooth, beaten copper without a single mark upon it. It would be natural to wonder what was hidden inside.

When the lid was finally pried off, a plague of evils flew from the jar like so many wayward souls. Sickness and toil and ruin and greed. . . and Sasuke tuned out most of the list until Lee got to the end. Hope was the very last, trapped at the bottom of the jar, and Pandora sealed the lid up again before it could escape.

Lee stopped reading. He was looking off into the distance, and the expression on his face suggested that he was actually thinking about this seriously.

"That must be because hope is the one thing that can be used to combat the evil in the world," Lee decided, with just a spark of his old, over-the-top attitude. "Hope has to be kept close so that it can't be broken."

That might have been the single most ridiculous thing he had heard out of Lee yet. Hope was. . . .

"That's wrong," Sasuke said coolly.

"Well, it is inappropriate to train someone specifically to do a task for you and then blame them for doing it."

That had absolutely nothing to do with what Sasuke had objected to. He was still thinking about hope seething in the bottom of an unbreakable jar, underneath all the mundane evils of the world.

They were both silent, Lee studying his scroll and Sasuke pointedly not looking directly at Lee.

Finally Lee spoke again, with a level seriousness that Sasuke hadn't expected. "I think this story is meant to illustrate how hope appears along with adversity. Hope is what we have to overcome those evils."

He said it with such intense honesty that Sasuke couldn't help wondering why Lee had chosen to argue the morals of some distant country's folklore. Especially to Sasuke, of all people.

"If hope was meant to overcome adversity, why didn't it destroy everything else while they were together in the jar?"

Sasuke knew, even as he answered, that Lee's thought was wrong at the absolute root. There was only one reason for hope to be hidden underneath all the other evils prepared to plague the world. Hope was the last and most dangerous of all of them. That was why Pandora had tried, at the very least, to keep hope trapped inside.

Just looking at Lee, with his determined face and damaged body, made it plain that hope had to have escaped that jar. It was plaguing Lee even now. Sometimes, too much of the time, Sasuke felt it plaguing him as well.

Sasuke suddenly realized that he was staring at Lee. Not just looking sideways, acknowledging Lee's existence, but openly looking into Lee's face. He'd felt an unexpected scrap of sympathy, and maybe regret, to see Lee so trapped by his own stubborn hopes. The thought flitted at the back of Sasuke's mind even as he saw Lee's brows lift from determination to confusion.

"Sasuke-kun," Lee started.

Knowing Lee would probably ask him what he was doing, or even what he was thinking, Sasuke rose to his feet and turned away in one smooth motion. He refused to even glance back, effectively snubbing Lee.

"I don't have any more time to waste on your stories."

Lee called his name a second time as he walked off, but Sasuke paid that no mind.

He has less luck ignoring his thoughts. One question kept teasing around inside his head, no matter how he tried to banish it. Why had Lee chosen to speak to him about hope of all things? Lee was far too honest for his own good, and he had easily betrayed the fact that he was serious about what he was saying.

Curiosity nipped away at Sasuke, the same way that hope plagued Lee. He had to leave those unproductive thoughts behind. Let all of this stay back in that clearing, where Lee once used to train.


End file.
